Chocolate box art
{{Short description|Term describing idealistic paintings}}
{{Redirect|Chocolate box}}
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File:Driessen Bonbon doosje, foto 1.JPG
Chocolate box art originally referred literally to decorations on chocolate boxes. Over the years, however, the terminology has changed; it is now applied broadly as an often pejorative term to describe paintings and designs that are overly idealistic and sentimental.{{fact|date=August 2023}}
Using his own paintings of children, flowers and holiday scenes Richard Cadbury, the son of the founder of Cadbury's, introduced such designs to his chocolate boxes in the late 19th century.[http://www.cadbury.co.uk/cadburyandchocolate/ourstory/packaging/Pages/richardcadbury.aspx "Cadbury chocolate box"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090520074709/http://www.cadbury.co.uk/cadburyandchocolate/ourstory/packaging/Pages/richardcadbury.aspx |date=2009-05-20 }}. Cadbury.
Renoir's paintings have been described as "chocolate box" and have been derided by Degas and Picasso for being happy, inoffensive scenes.{{cite news |last=Jones |first=Jonathan |date=12 February 2007 |url=https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2007/feb/12/art.features11 |title=Angry young man |newspaper=The Guardian |access-date=9 July 2021 }} Constable's landscapes have also been so described.{{cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/culture/culturevultureblog/2006/may/25/lanscapesofgl |title=Landscapes of gloom |work=The Guardian |date=25 May 2006 |access-date=9 July 2021 |last=Jones |first=Jonathan }}
Aelbert Cuyp's River Landscape (1660), despite being widely regarded as his best work, has been criticised as having "chocolate box blandness".{{cite news |last=Denny |first=Ned |date=18 March 2002 |url=https://www.newstatesman.com/node/155192 |title=Cuyp cake |work=New Statesman |access-date=9 July 2021 }} Fred Swan is a modern-day proponent of chocolate box paintings as, to his detractors, was Thomas Kinkade.{{cite news| url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/kinkade-king-of-kitsch-coming-to--a-home-near-you-683724.html| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090627065823/http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/kinkade-king-of-kitsch-coming-to--a-home-near-you-683724.html| url-status=dead| archive-date=27 June 2009| title=Kinkade, king of kitsch, coming to a home near you |newspaper=The Independent|date=5 May 2001| accessdate=8 May 2009| location=London |first=Cahal| last=Milmo}}{{cite news| url=https://www.salon.com/2002/03/18/light_4/ |title=The Writer of Dreck™ |first=Laura |last=Miller |date=March 18, 2002 |work=Salon.com |access-date=December 5, 2016}}
The term has also been applied to sculpture. A young couple standing locked in an embrace forms the centrepiece for the St Pancras International station in central London. Entitled The Meeting Place, the sculpture is by Briton Paul Day who admitted, "Some will say it is a chocolate box sculpture".{{cite news |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/art-that-embraces-a-new-future-for-st-pancras-436300.html |title=Art that embraces a new future for St Pancras |first=Cahal |last=Milmo |newspaper=The Independent|date=14 February 2007 |accessdate=11 December 2016}}